Windows 8 will consolidate restarts in monthly update

Windows 8 will consolidate restarts in monthly update
One of the changes in Windows 8 is new behavior related to automatic restarts when updates are installed.

In the latest post on the Building Windows 8 blog, Farzana Rahman of the Windows Update team explained what these changes are, and why they were made.



Farzana identified the sometimes frequent notifications from Windows Update as a common complaint among Windows Users. The main problems, she says, is that most people don't want to be bothered when updates are about to be installed and they don't want their work disrupted by a restart.

In order to address these issues, a number of changes were made in Windows 8. Perhaps the most significant was moving every update which requires a restart, but which isn't considered critical, into the monthly security release.

This will result in restarts happening less often.

In addition, rather than bugging you frequently when your computer needs to be restarted following the monthly security update, you will receive notifications on the login screen for 3 days before Windows automatically restarts.

She described the process in detail, complete with pictures:

  1. A message about the upcoming restart is shown in the login screen for three days or until the PC is restarted (whichever is sooner). This means you now have three days to restart the PC at your convenience. All you need to do is see the login screen once in 3 days to see the message about the upcoming restart and by default the lock screen will appear after 15-minute idle timeout.
    <b>Windows 8</b> Windows Update Restart Changes 1

  2. In addition to the restart notification on the login screen, the Power options on the lock screen will change to ?Update and restart? immediately after the update occurs, and will include ?Update and shutdown? on days two and three, to make the message even more apparent to you. This allows you to restart your PC at your own convenience.
    <b>Windows 8</b> Windows Update Restart Changes 2

    <b>Windows 8</b> Windows Update Restart Changes 3

  3. If after three days, the restart still has not occurred, then WU will automatically restart your PC for you. In this case, the automatic restart will happen either at the end of the three-day grace period, or, to prevent data loss if WU detects that there are critical applications open at the end of the three-day grace period, it will wait to automatically restart the next time you login. I?ll address this behavior in more depth in the next section.
    <b>Windows 8</b> Windows Update Restart Changes 4

  4. After the restart has occurred, the message on the login screen will go away and the power options will revert to the original choices. We know people would like Windows to automatically log in after the restart, but we strongly advise against doing so, given the potential security issues with this configuration.
    <b>Windows 8</b> Windows Update Restart Changes 5




In addition to addressing Windows updates, she also mentioned the company's online Windows Store, which will be used to distribute applications, will feature some options for delivering automatic updates for third party programs. However, she left the details for a future post.

Written by: Rich Fiscus @ 15 Nov 2011 14:44
Tags
Windows 8 blog restart Windows Update
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  • 5 comments
  • dali

    Wow, thank you so much, Microsoft!

    You are getting close to the behaviour of my linux boxes, which need to be restarted never but for hardware maintenance or certain major kernel upgrades... And that's how it has been in the linux world for over 15 years.

    So, yeah, well done, guys. :P

    "You know, it seems that quotes on the internet are becoming less and less reliable." -Abraham Lincoln.

    15.11.2011 20:15 #1

  • KillerBug

    LoL...maybe, just maybe, they should try to make the updates install quickly so it isn't even a concern to most people. 99% of the public turn their computers off when they stop using them...how about making the updates install quickly so you don't need authorization for the 20 minute install of a 300K update?


    15.11.2011 23:44 #2

  • juventini

    Originally posted by dali: Wow, thank you so much, Microsoft!

    You are getting close to the behaviour of my linux boxes, which need to be restarted never but for hardware maintenance or certain major kernel upgrades... And that's how it has been in the linux world for over 15 years.

    So, yeah, well done, guys. :P
    NICE!

    Forza Juve!!

    16.11.2011 11:30 #3

  • gilboa

    How about a button "Update"
    How About

    groupBox "Update Options"

    a button "Begin Long Run Update could take many hours"
    a checkbox "Shutdown on completion"
    a checkbox "Restart after shutdown"
    a button "Exit - I will update at another time"

    This way I can backup whenever I feel like it and please don't remind me if I haven't "Updated" I don't want to.

    19.11.2011 16:45 #4

  • pmshah

    Presently I am testing both 32 & 64 bit versions.

    I am not much worried about the updates as I work on these OSes for may only a couple of hours a day. I have yet to experience a straight 3 days uninterrupted operation of Win 7. Memory usage even on a x64, 6 GB machine climbs to 75 - 80% from initial 30%.

    What is critical in my opinion is the abilty of the OS to query and ascertain if there are any available Homegroups on the local lan before blindly creating one and making life hell in trying to enable file sharing.

    A shutdown button would also be nice to have SOMEWHERE instead of having to use Alt+F4 or Ctrl+Alt+Del.

    BTW if it is there I haven't found it !!!!

    20.11.2011 03:33 #5

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